"As verbose as [Infinite Jest] is, and as long as it is, it never wants to punish you for some knowledge you lack, nor does it want to send you to the dictionary every few pages."
- Dave Eggers, Infinite Jest Forward
Definitive Jest, the word-of-the-day project based on David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, began many years ago, on 1 January 2012. Absent any particular reason, I ceased working on it in at the end of 2013. It was a mostly enjoyable endeavour and the response from readers was often rewarding.
Many people have started Infinite Jest. There was a time, at least as far as I remember, when a serious reader of fiction was supposed to have a dogeared copy. Many fewer have finished the book than the first page, chapter, let alone the halfway point. At least that's the impression one gets from any review or discussion of the book. I suspect that, having met at least a few of the characters, a certain inevitable forward progress often develops. Having completed the book twice, and taking a certain snootish pride in that fact, it gnawed at me to have left Definitive Jest unfinished. It continues to bother me, if somewhat less frequently.
So, I'm going to finish this goddamned thing. One of my personal weaknesses is an inability to put things down, to give them up; I may as well let you, reader, benefit.
The richness of plot and language are intertwined in David Foster Wallace's work. My main copy of the book contains words highlighted from the first to last page that are, and are eventually to be, entries here. To just pick up where I left off, absent the context involved reading provides, feels like it's missing the point. So I'm going to read the thing one final - and last - time. As I go, I'll be able to use the work I've done to make sense of my own reading, likely adding new or clarifying existing entries.
This is a work of recovery, in a few days. I'm recovering the work I've done, recovering my own interest and engagement in DFW's work, and it's also a project supporting my own, ongoing recovery. I'm a very different person than I was over a decade ago when this whole thing began. Almost everything in the material aspects of my life has changed, the world has changed, you've changed, we've changed collectively... but language still remains an enduring, personal love.
...
On a pragmatic note, blogs used to be pretty state-of-the-art, X was Twitter, and social media still felt almost innocent. If any of you have any suggestions on how to update the presentation or delivery of this work, I'm all of two ears.
Thank you for your time, for your patience, and for sharing this journey with me. I hope you're well. Even you Dave Eggers.
